"Someone's Got To Be The Taliban"

Oh dear, yet another politician fails to recognise that computer games are NOT REAL and that when you are controlling an avatar in online play, in no way does it cast any aspersions upon the game, its content, the player or the producers of the game. Liam Fox is the Defence Secretary for the Government, and his comments on the latest Medal of Honour game have created, well not furore, but a vague incredulous disappointment that a politician has said something a bit crap and irrelevant.

I play console games, and if they are well made, have replay value and evoke an emotional reaction of some kind or at least an adrenaline spike, then I cannot give any thought to the socio-political connotations of said game. Manhunt, a third person stalk and slay number, attracted all sorts of fuss - even being 'banned' and yet people played it. The Grand Theft Auto series has been mired in the same controversy - and yet it still sells immeasurably well. Controversy is a marketing tool, regardless of where it originates and the idea that video games contribute to the degradation of the culture allows us the luxury of avoiding confrontation with the larger issues and forces that actually do undermine our values and communities, some of which ironically have been implemented and supported by the ideology of Liam Fox's party. You have to love the Conservatives, really.